Easter 2019 09 30

Pastor Bill Bush · Apr 23, 2019

Big Idea

Quoting the message: When all seems hopeless, hope walks through the door, end quote.—and that hope has a name, Jesus Christ.

Jesus is not just a future event or a feeling but a living person who walks through our locked doors of hopelessness, just as He did for Thomas. What looks like a setback in our lives is really God's setup to draw us to see and embrace the living hope of the risen Jesus.

Key points

1
1Hope can die when our own plans fall apart
Pastor Bill tells the story of his high school baseball career, complete with college scholarships and scout interest, being ended in an instant by a catastrophic knee injury while chasing a line drive. Waking from eight and a half hours of surgery, he was told he would never play baseball again, and in that moment his hope died.
2
2Jesus' disciples experienced this same hopelessness on the first Easter
Pastor Bill explains that the disciples had pinned all their hope on Jesus establishing an earthly kingdom, and when He died on the cross, their hope died with Him. They hid behind locked doors in fear, unable to imagine what Easter would actually bring.
3
3When all seems hopeless, hope walks through the door
This is the big idea Pastor Bill returns to throughout: Jesus walked out of the tomb alive and later appeared inside a locked room without opening the door, showing that He shows up even when we've shut Him out.
4
4Thomas needed to see Jesus for himself, and isolation kept him from that moment
Pastor Bill walks through John 20:24-29, noting Thomas was absent when Jesus first appeared, likely because his brokenness made him withdraw from the other disciples. Because he isolated himself, he missed out on hope walking through the door and refused to believe until he could see and touch Jesus' wounds.
5
5A week later Jesus appeared again and met Thomas exactly where he was
Jesus specifically invited Thomas to touch His wounds, showing He knew what Thomas had said even though He wasn't physically present to hear it. Thomas responded, my Lord and my God, becoming the first disciple to explicitly declare Jesus as God.
6
6Jesus says those who believe without seeing are blessed, and hope is a person, not a thing
Pastor Bill unpacks Jesus' words to Thomas and then Peter's letter written decades later to suffering believers, showing that hope is not a future event or a possession but the living person of Jesus Christ, an imperishable inheritance that never fades like earthly blessings do.
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7Setbacks are really setups to see the living hope
Pastor Bill returns to his hospital story, describing how in fury he threw his Bible out of his room, only to have a nurse who knew Jesus quietly bring it back and whisper that he would need it. That moment became his setup to surrender to Jesus, and he later spent decades as a youth pastor walking other broken young people through the same kind of setback into hope.

Application

Pastor Bill's charge is to stop pushing back against God and instead embrace the setup He is using to bring you the living hope.

Name the hope that has died in you
Identify whatever blew out in your life, whether a relationship, career, or a hurt you can't even name, that has made you doubt God's power and love.
Stay near Jesus' people, not isolated
Like Thomas, don't withdraw when you're broken; keep showing up with the church, because that's where Jesus tends to reveal Himself most.
Stop treating your setback as a pushback
Instead of using your pain to argue with God, recognize it as a setup meant to draw your attention to the living hope of Jesus.
Put your faith in Jesus as your only hope
Pray and turn from chasing your own hopes and dreams, trusting what Jesus did on the cross and in His resurrection as the only way to be made right with God.
If you're not ready, keep showing up anyway
Even in doubt or confusion, follow Thomas's example: keep hanging around God's people and come back next week to see what happens.

Take it into your week

Scripture in this message

From the transcript
“I wanna look at what happened next, right after that moment, because hope had to come in again. And and and I think we can relate to this character I wanna talk about. It's in John 20, just a few verses here, and it's starts at verse 24, and it says, one of the 12 disciples, Thomas”
Read the whole chapter →
From the transcript
“They find him on that first Easter, and they tell him, we've seen the Lord in verse 25. But he replied, I won't believe it. He just he says, I'm not gonna believe it”
From the transcript
“It says at that moment, verse 28, my lord and my god, Thomas exclaimed. So he he he went from pouting Thomas to doubting Thomas, and now he's shouting Thomas”
From the transcript
“he ended up writing a couple books of the Bible. And one of them is a letter called first Peter. He was writing it decades later. Decades couple decades later, he's writing this letter, and it it's going out to a church”
From the transcript
“look what he says. He says, blessed be the god and father of our lord Jesus Christ. According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again into a living hope to the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. He mentions Easter and he says, what is the blessing? A living hope”
Paraphrase of the transcript
he says, this is a hope that doesn't let you down. See, all these other hopes, they're blessings. Playing baseball is a blessing. Having a married, blessing. Kids, depends on the day. that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you by God's power.
From the transcript
“in this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you've been grieved by various trials, So, that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold and perishes though it is tested by fire may be found to result in the praise and glory and honor of the revelation of Jesus”
From the transcript
“And then look in verse eight, he says this incredible thing. He says this, he's remembering this conversation and what Jesus said to Thomas on this morning, that first Easter. Though you have not seen him, you love him”
From the transcript
“Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him, and you rejoice with a joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory. He says, you don't see him just like Peter got to see his resurrection”

7-day devotional

A personal reading plan from this message — scripture, reflection, and prayer for each day.

Day 1

The first Easter evening was not a celebration. The people who loved Jesus most were huddled behind a locked door, afraid, grief-stricken, and out of answers. Their hope had not just been delayed — it felt completely dead. They had believed Jesus was the one who would change everything, and now He was gone. So they hid. It is easy to read this scene and think, "I would have responded differently." But most of us know what it feels like to lock a door against the world when something we deeply believed in has collapsed. A diagnosis arrives. A relationship ends. A plan we were certain God had approved falls completely apart. The instinct is to go quiet, go inward, and wonder what went wrong. What is striking here is that Jesus did not wait for His followers to compose themselves before He showed up. He walked right through the locked door and stood among them — exactly as they were, afraid and confused. He did not scold them for hiding. He said, "Peace be with you." The locked room is not a barrier to Jesus. Whatever you have shut yourself inside today — grief, confusion, disappointment — He is not standing outside it waiting for you to get it together. He is already in the room with you.

For reflection

Is there a locked door in your life right now — something you have shut yourself inside because hope feels too costly to hold? What would it mean to let Jesus meet you there?

Pray

Pray for the courage to stop hiding from Jesus in your hardest moments and to receive the peace He is already offering.

Small-group discussion guide

For leading a group conversation about this message.

Open

Thomas had spent time with Jesus, watched miracles, and still ended up in a locked room with his hope shattered. This message explores what Jesus does with exactly that kind of moment.

Discussion questions

1
In John 20:19, the disciples were hiding behind locked doors, afraid and grieving. What does that picture tell us about what real hope-loss can look like — even for people who have been close to Jesus?
2
When Jesus appears to Thomas in John 20:27, He uses Thomas's own words back to him. What does that say about how Jesus shows up in moments of doubt?
3
Peter writes in 1 Peter 1:3 that believers are born into a 'living hope' through the resurrection of Jesus. What difference does it make that hope is described as a person who rose from the dead, rather than a future outcome we're waiting for?
4
In 1 Peter 1:6-7, Peter connects trials with the refinement of faith — the way fire tests gold. How might that reframe the way we think about setbacks that seem to take away something we were counting on?
5
Thomas missed Jesus the first time because he was absent from the gathered disciples. The message also pointed to 1 Peter 1:8 — loving and believing in Someone we haven't physically seen. What role does being present with God's people seem to play in how hope gets renewed?
6
The pastor challenged us to consider that life's hardest moments can be setups to see Jesus more clearly, rather than signs of God's absence. How might that shift in perspective change the way we walk alongside someone who is in a season of loss or collapse right now?

Pray together

Jesus as the living hope who walks through locked doors — ask Him to make Himself known in the places where hope feels lost

Topics

Community and Encountering Jesus Doubt and Faith Jesus as Living Hope Setbacks as God's Setup

Easter 2019 09 30

Big Idea

Key points

Application

Take it into your week

Scripture in this message

7-day devotional

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

Day 4

Day 5

Day 6

Day 7

Small-group discussion guide

Open

Discussion questions

Pray together